Way Down Yonder

Monday December 27, 04by Peter Filichia, TheaterMania.com

...Then I got to the modest 200-seat Marigny, and found it nearly full, which rather surprised me. Boston Marriage isn't one of Mamet's better-known plays, so I assumed that the theater would be empty. But maybe everyone else, like me, wasn't finding it easy to discover theater in the Big Easy. The Saenger, the town's big road house, was dark until Thoroughly Modern Millie opens next month. Granted, I could have gone to Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre and seen Tru without Robert Morse, but my heart was broken that I'd just missed their season opener of A Day in Hollywood/A Night in the Ukraine and I was too early to see their next production, Eating Raoul: The Musical. (Did we ever think we'd see that one again?) As you can see, Le Petit is one adventurous company. Right now, though, they're renovating their 450-seat mainstage theater and are using their 120-seat second space for all productions. So I guess it should really be temporarily renamed Le Petit Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre. Boston Marriage takes its inspiration from the term used in the 19th century when two women, who may or may not have been lesbians, lived together. I'm so glad to say that Luis Q. Barroso's production was equal to the New York one. Diana E.H. Shores was steely as Anna, the realist who may love Claire very much but still isn't above taking both a male lover and a magnificent stone from him. Melissa Hall was nicely coquettish as Claire, who's fallen in love with a younger woman -- who turns out to be the daughter of Anna's benefactor. You know, on second thought, I do like this play.